News Article: "Jimson weed users chase high all the way to hospital"

Saw this article in the newspaper today. Thought some of the quotes were kinda silly. See for yourself:

Jimson weed users chase high all the way to hospital
Posted 11/1/2006 10:13 PM ET{}{}
Jimson weed is also known as stinkweed, locoweed and moonflower.

JIMSON WEED FACTS
{}•Details: Part of the nightshade family, jimson weed is a poisonous plant that contains chemicals such as atropine and scopolamine, which can cause sensory deprivation and hallucinations.
The plant has purple stems, large leaves with irregular teeth and trumpet-shaped flowers that open in the evening.
The fruit pods are prickly and split into four chambers containing seeds. The plants smell bad when crushed.•Effects: The effects of taking jimson weed seeds can last for days. Overdoses can lead to seizures, comas and respiratory arrest.By Donna Leinwand {}
Teenagers seeking a hallucinogenic high from the seeds of a poisonous weed that now is in bloom are landing in hospitals across the country, police and health officials say.
Fall is prime time for jimson weed, a legal plant that can grow nearly anywhere. Police and hospitals have reported scattered outbreaks of jimson weed poisonings in California, Colorado, Indiana, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
"Lunatic, crazy kids," says Dodge County, Wis., Sheriff Todd Nehls, whose deputies picked up three hallucinating teenagers in October. "I can't imagine what would possess them to start eating strange seeds from the pod of some plant that they read about on the Internet."
Poison centers last year recorded 975 incidents involving anti-cholinergic plants such as jimson weed, down from 1,058 in 2004, according to the American Association of Poison Control Centers' annual report.
Poisonings typically increase in late summer and fall when jimson weed plants are at their peak, says Steven Marcus, director of the New Jersey Poison Information and Education System in Newark. New Jersey has had three reports of poisonings since July, he says.
"It's all over the place," Marcus says. "You can find it on the side of the road."
Jimson weed also is known as stinkweed, locoweed and moonflower. Its pods contain seeds that when eaten or brewed in a tea can cause severe hallucinations and other reactions, including dry mouth, overheating, agitation, urinary retention and hallucinations, Marcus says. Overdoses can lead to seizures, comas or death. It can take up to an hour for someone to feel the effects, so people often consume excessive amounts, thinking the seeds aren't working, he says.
Most people hospitalized after eating jimson weed have hallucinations that make them so erratic they are a danger to themselves, Marcus says. Some cannot urinate and need to have a catheter inserted.
Richard MacKenzie, an emergency room physician who treated a victim last month at Lehigh Valley Hospital and Health Network in Allentown, Pa., says doctors have a saying about jimson weed users: "Hot as a hare, blind as a bat, dry as a bone, red as a beet, mad as a hatter." Such patients are "hallucinating up a storm, talking to people in the room who aren't there, removing (imaginary) bugs from their body," he says.
In the Lehigh Valley area, three youths who ate the seeds were hospitalized in October. The first incident on Oct. 8 puzzled police in Slatington, Pa., who responded to a call about a delusional 15-year-old boy, Police Chief Dave Rachman says. When officers asked the boy to put on his shoes, he put his gym bag on one foot, Rachman says.
Slatington police determined the source of the problem two days later, when officers in a nearby town found two Slatington youths who were hallucinating, Rachman says. One had seeds in his pocket that he said he had gotten from plants on the banks of the Lehigh River, Rachman says.
"Every year we get this," says Tim Munsch of the Lehigh Valley Drug and Alcohol Intake Unit. He says the use of jimson weed rarely becomes a drug trend because few people use it twice.
"I don't know any kids who do it and then do it again," he says.

"Lunatic, crazy kids," says Dodge County, Wis., Sheriff Todd Nehls, whose deputies picked up three hallucinating teenagers in October. "I can't imagine what would possess them to start eating strange seeds from the pod of some plant that they read about on the Internet."

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LOL... I used to feel teenagers like this were victims of the war on drugs (i.e. because of the innate human desire to change one's consciousness) and that people like the Sheriff would never understand that.

However, these days he's more inclined to agree with the Sheriff. Why didn't the teens search the Net more in-depth and find out about kratom and other ethnobotanicals that actually give a person a decent buzz rather than poisoning them? Or even look into research chemicals (but I guess that takes *real* intelligence to make heads or tails of). There are smart ways to get around the drug war, then there are the idiots who stick their fingers into light sockets, eat poisonous plants, snort model airplane glue, inject embalming fluid and hang themselves by the neck to get high.

"I can't imagine what would possess them to start eating strange seeds from the pod of some plant that they read about on the Internet."

I agree with you Nicaine, but I feel like this Sheriff probably has a pretty closed mind about drugs in general. What would possess them to try something like this? Probably the need and desire for new experiences and enlightenment, and maybe just a plain ol' break from reality. Our society suppress that need. Our only outlets are drinking alcohol and teens aren't even allowed to do that. Simple boredom "possesses" them to do these things. That's the downside to the war on drugs. All the safe, legit drugs are illegal!

Yeah, the sheriff's probably no better... ill informed and possibly even stupid himself.

But you're arguing what I just said I no longer agree with, so we disagree. Whatever possessed them to try something like this could also have possessed them to order some kratom or kanna instead. Drinking alcohol *is not* the only outlet if one has a brain and is willing to use it, that's my point. If they found out about jimson weed on the Net, they could have continued to research and found some decent legal highs (which clearly exist, albeit not in huge numbers, but then they don't need to).

I was one of those dumb kids many years ago, long before the internet though. Back in school I had just discovered smoking weed, and asumed there must be many other plants that also got one high.
When a mate told swim about some flowers growing at the back of a house on the way to town, swim rounded up his most loyal partners in crime, waited until the middle of the night, and snuck into the back of the house and proceded to start bagging up the mystery flowers.
Well half way through the mission an old man came out of the house and siad "Do you boys want those flowers to get high on?"
Once the boys said yes, the old man said "I used to do that when I was your age, now days I just have a little in my cup of tea to relax me".
Everyone figured if this old guy has been using them all that time, they must be fairly safe, and headed home with the loot.
Over the next week everyone tried everything from smoking and brewing teas to eating the flowers and soaking in vodka, with various results. Bacically every scallywag kid in the school was out of it one way or another, so much so that the authorities sent the sniffer dogs through the school looking for weed, but went away empty handed.
Eventually a couple of my friends got so [email protected] up they just got up and started walking around the class, one of them hitting the teacher, thinking he was turning off an annoying television.
They then admitted exactly what they had been upto and named everyone involved, and were taken off to the padded cells.
It was years later swim read Datura was once used as a truth serum on criminals, as it blocks ones ability to tell lies.

Whoa, interesting story thirdedge. LOL the whole school was getting high off it. Funny thing about this article is that recently I actually considered trying this stuff because it grows ALL over around here, but decided not to after reading about it being a deadly poison in high doses. What did the "high" feel like to you?

When I was about 9 or 10, I ate too much Christmas candy, and was catching some sort of bug. I woke up with a fever and I couldn't get out of my dream. I didn't know where I was or what time it was. I was totally disoriented. It took me about 5 minutes to get any sense of my surroundings. It was terrible.

When I was about 9 or 10, I ate too much Christmas candy, and was catching some sort of bug. I woke up with a fever and I couldn't get out of my dream. I didn't know where I was or what time it was. I was totally disoriented. It took me about 5 minutes to get any sense of my surroundings. It was terrible.

The word is that some people do enjoy deleriants from time to time (high-dose diphenhydramine and other antihistamines fall into this category as well), although SWIM strongly suspects the great majority of users are kids/teens unable to obtain anything else worthwhile to get high on. These substances can feel crappy even in small doses, and it's almost unimaginable what a high dose might resemble. A severe poisoning, I'd imagine.

Yeah, Swim definetly wouldn,t take it again. Funnily enough it seemed to do nothing or F all the first few try's, then suddenly whammo. A minority of people do seem to enjoy it at the time, but most regret it after. I was partially blind for a couple of days afterward and experienced the worst dry mouth he has ever had during the trip.
I would rate Datura as the crappiest drug he has tried, and hes tried a few. Even solvents would rate higher than this crap.
The one good thing to come from the experience is he now treats new substances with the upmost respect, doing much research before consuming anything.

LOL... I used to feel teenagers like this were victims of the war on drugs (i.e. because of the innate human desire to change one's consciousness) and that people like the Sheriff would never understand that.

However, these days he's more inclined to agree with the Sheriff. Why didn't the teens search the Net more in-depth and find out about kratom and other ethnobotanicals that actually give a person a decent buzz rather than poisoning them? Or even look into research chemicals (but I guess that takes *real* intelligence to make heads or tails of). There are smart ways to get around the drug war, then there are the idiots who stick their fingers into light sockets, eat poisonous plants, snort model airplane glue, inject embalming fluid and hang themselves by the neck to get high.

Stupid, crazy kids.

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Well these same kids dont have the knowledge to think to search the internet. There's no ad's telling people to research what there takeing, but there is plenty to tell them not to do it. Alot of people I have known and seen, dont think before they act. Just look at how many people smoke cigs, even when they know there probably going to die a horrible death.... I must agree on the drug war concept, because it's very very true. If you could just go buy perscriptions or grow your own, this wouldn't happen. People would just grow some mushrooms and trip or grow some Marijuana and feel high. Because one way or another, there going to get some type of "high" if they can help it. Education and then being able to make a educated decision is key. Not people trying to be, a second mommy and daddy, and locking you in a room smaller then your used with bars and real criminals, flat out saying NO.

-someone running in the middle of the highway, at night, thinking it was a huge yellow slide...got arrested by the cops if I recall well the story

-two guys entered a swimming pool to go and play with red eyed dolphins (yeah they shared the hallucinations, and both thought these dolphins were real and it didn't seemed strange to them that these would be in the pool)...they both got drown

-one guy coming down from his datura trip found himself in an unknown city, 200km from his home, without any memory of what happened

-a girl at a rave, walking all naked in the middle of people with empty eyes and incoherent speech (and most probably no idea of who she was, how she got there and what she was doing)

-4 guys and 1 girl that had all been taking datura (without knowing it, it had been sold to them as peyote!).
They all saw a demonic entity in the room, which they felt was the "master of the ceremony", this entity was present during the all trip...the 4 guys went very bestial, they spent a few minutes tearing up the clothes of their girl friend and then spent a few hours scratching her frenetically with their fingers tips. From the report "their girl friend went through it by retreating into a consummate sadomasochism".

-people getting stuck on datura for their very first trip (i.e. stuck for many months, not sure they will ever completely recover from it!)

-a friend of I was in a squat were several unknown peoples were drinking a datura tea that has been made from an unknown amount of plant. One quickly died from overheating at 43°C (in front of my friend eyes), another was taken to the hospital in emergency to be reanimated (with extreme overheating, complete delirium, very agitated and extremely fast heartbeat, meaning flirting with cardiac failure). He survived. A third guy that had been drinking the same stuff was ok but completely creazy for 3 days (meaning like "can you remember your name?", answer: "well the horses are gone you know").
Great isn't it?

I'm pretty surprised I never heard about any "jumped through the window" story...

-two guys entered a swimming pool to go and play with red eyed dolphins (yeah they shared the hallucinations, and both thought these dolphins were real and it didn't seemed strange to them that these would be in the pool)...they both got drown

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If they both drowned how does anyone know what they were hallucinating and why they went into the pool?

Genaro said:

-one guy coming down from his datura trip found himself in an unknown city, 200km from his home, without any memory of what happened

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Interestingly enough, swim knows a guy who this happened to, except that the drug used was alcohol and the guy somehow woke up from a blackout in Texas with his Mexican passport on the other side of the border so he had to smuggle himself from the US into Mexico, haha. All from alcohol...

Genaro said:

-people getting stuck on datura for their very first trip (i.e. stuck for many months, not sure they will ever completely recover from it!)

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I have heard of Datura and other Nightshades having pretty long lasting effects, but weeks or months sounds a bit far fetched to me besides unless the people this happened to had a psychological condition that was triggered by the trip. Any report / article / urban legend in particular you are referring to with this sentence?

But yeah.... Nightshades aren't something to mess with. If you are that desperate to get high you are willing to try this crap I'd just start running around the room in circles until you get dizzy, it would probably be more worthwhile in the end and you don't fuck with your body and mind!

"If they both drowned how does anyone know what they were hallucinating and why they went into the pool?"

well this one is from a serious toxicology book about plants. The story is known cause the two guys had told all this to a girl that was at the party, the girl dissuaded them from going in the pool and left them (thinking they had understood this was a bad idea to go and catch the red eyed dolphins in the pool)...they were found drown on the next morning.

"but weeks or months sounds a bit far fetched"

I've met a few people who've seen such thing happening to acquaintance of them. Probably caused by excessive dose and/or mixes with other drug I guess.

SWIM made isopropanol extraction of brugmansia leaves and smoked the resulting green hash-type material to good effect. He felt relaxed and had slight visual hallucinations which felt like dream states with eyes closed.

Oh cmon Jimson Weed can't really be all that bad. I suggest a few of you try it out, record your trip and then post it on Youtube..... Hell you should have a Jimson Weed party!!! Invite like twenty or thirty people and have everyone ingest a safe amount of Jimson weed.... just make sure you have 1 or 2 sober people present with video recording devices. Im sure everyone will have a blast!!!

Jabba420 added 7 Minutes and 9 Seconds later...

^^^^I forgot to mention selecting a good setting for a Jimson Weed party. Do NOT do this in the woods, people will end up scattering in all directions once they start tripping. Instead just do it in someone's house when parents are not home

Jabba420 added 15 Minutes and 37 Seconds later...

the right music for a Jimson Weed party is also important. I would go with "Rage against the Machine" and "Marilyn Manson"

Oh cmon Jimson Weed can't really be all that bad. I suggest a few of you try it out, record your trip and then post it on Youtube..... Hell you should have a Jimson Weed party!!! Invite like twenty or thirty people and have everyone ingest a safe amount of Jimson weed.... just make sure you have 1 or 2 sober people present with video recording devices. Im sure everyone will have a blast!!!

Jabba420 added 7 Minutes and 9 Seconds later...

^^^^I forgot to mention selecting a good setting for a Jimson Weed party. Do NOT do this in the woods, people will end up scattering in all directions once they start tripping. Instead just do it in someone's house when parents are not home

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I found this post funny up until I realized that some people will actually think this is a good idea. Then I just felt sorry that yet another uninformed teenager is going to do something stupid and provide more reason for the war on drugs. Especially if they post it on youtube... I mean, c'mon, seriously?!